EMS fee implemented in Murrieta

MURRIETA  A map of Murrieta hung from the wall in Fire Station 2 with fire engine stickers representing the city's five stations.

Fire Chief Matt Shobert walked over and pulled one of the stickers off the map. Just like that, the city of more than 100,000 residents went from five stations to four.

That's what would have transpired, Shobert says, if Murrieta didn't recently implement some controversial measures -- a subscription program charging families $48 a year to cover fire department emergency medical services, and a fee of $350 to be assessed to residents who do not sign up for the program but end up receiving medical attention from fire department paramedics. That fee does not include ambulance transportation.

"If that (closing a station) were to happen, it leaves a huge hole in our city," Shobert said. "So we're working real hard trying to generate a little bit of revenue through this cost-recovery program, to prevent that from happening."

The fee and the subscription program went into effect on Jan. 1. Shobert said he hopes the program can raise $350,000 to $400,000 this year.

As the city of Murrieta has wrestled in many ways with the economic downturn of the last four years, the fire department, which began providing emergency medical care when it started putting paramedics on its engines 12 years ago, has shouldered its share of the burden.

Shobert said the department has lost nine employees, or 17 percent of its workforce, over the last two years, and the vehicle replacement fund has been suspended.

In retrospect, he said, the best move probably would have been to start imposing fees to cover the department's emergency medical services back when they first started putting paramedics on trucks.

"Our biggest mistake was not implementing it a decade ago," Shobert said.

Murrieta Battalion Chief Steve Kean said cities such as Corona and Anaheim have had similar programs for years.

"This is not a new concept," Kean said. "It's something a lot of cities have done."

There have been similar efforts to recover costs for emergency medical service providers. A number of cities have enacted "crash taxes" that force drivers found to be at fault in accidents that require fire department and paramedic response to pay for the costs of dispatching those crews to the scene.

Chris Cate, the vice president of The San Diego Taxpayers Association, said his group was very active opposing those measures a couple of years ago when they started popping up in San Diego County.

"It was something we absolutely opposed here locally," Cate said.

Cate said the objections were based on new taxes being assessed for "basic services" such as police and fire protection.

Kean said that Murrieta doesn't follow the model for most cities, whose fire departments are funded through the city's general fund. The Murrieta Fire Department is part of a fire protection district, he said, and its funding is largely through property taxes. Shobert said that the housing crash which accompanied the economic downturn has resulted in about 30 percent less in property tax revenue flowing to the department.

"So here we were, we still have an operating deficit, with all the cuts that we had implemented," Shobert said. "And we're still not where we needed to be."

Property owners in the city are also assessed $40 a year for fire protection services.

The subscription program, which is specifically for emergency medical services provided by the department, has its supporters and those who are on the fence. It also has its critics, and Shobert knows all about them.

"There's a percentage (of people) who are very angry," Shobert said.

Recently, Shobert said, he spent more than an hour with a resident who came to his office to talk about the subscription program.

Certainly, Shobert has heard the argument from residents who say they have to work within a budget, and so should he. But his thoughts keep returning to that map with the five fire engine stickers.

"Well, the answer to that is we will live within our budget," he said. "Without this added revenue stream, we're looking at peeling one of those engines off the map. And that's what I'm working my tail off to try to prevent."